Zellers worker Angela Rankin is part of a national campaign that asks global retailer Target for fairness.

Zellers worker Steve Campbell is part of a national campaign that asks global retailer Target for fairness.

www.targetfairness.ca campaign erects billboards in major cities across Canada to Ask Target Corp. for Fairness by respecting the experience, loyalty and hard-earned employment standards of Zellers workers.

A national campaign led by Zellers workers is drawing the attention of daily commuters, visitors, local business owners and passers-by in a number of cities across Canada. The campaign led by Zellers workers began rolling out billboards and bus-stop ads earlier this month in over a dozen metropolitan areas, including Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto, Trois-Rivières, Sherbrooke and Halifax.

The www.targetfairness.ca campaign is hoping the billboards and bus-stop ads will remind Target about its stated commitment to the community and social responsibility, and will help the public to know about Target’s decision to overlook the experience, loyalty and hard-earned employment standards of Zellers workers.

Shortly after purchasing a number of Zellers operations throughout the country, Target announced that every job in the converted stores will be filled by new hires, and the Zellers workers will have to reapply for the same job, at the same store, for starting pay. A number of Zellers workers have worked at the same location for more than 25 years; some of their stories are featured on www.targetfairness.ca.

“I've worked for the company for a long time; I've earned the respect of the company, and the idea that a company will come in and in a backhanded way get me fired and rehired with none of the benefits I've worked for really bothers me,” says Steve Campbell, who has worked at Zellers since 1998, and who appears on some of the billboards featured across the country.

“The Canadian government needs to stand up for the Canadian people,” adds Angela Rankin, a Zellers worker with more than 13 years of service, who too is featured on a number of the billboards. To date, the federal government has not responded to the growing concern surrounding the Zellers takeover by Target.

Since Campbell, Rankin and other Zellers workers launched their website www.targetfairness.ca, supporters of the Ask Target for Fairness campaign have stood with the group by sending letters to Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel, and by alerting their Facebook friends and Twitter followers.

A number of Facebookers have answered the social networking call by “Liking” www.facebook.com/targetfairness, where some have expressed their disappointment with Target’s decision, including Sharleen who says, “Zeller has served our communities for decades. It has been an integral part of our lives for years! Keep these valuable workers Target; our neighbours and friends deserved fairness for the many years of good service to us!”

“The Target brand is well known in Canada, and many Canadians are looking forward to visiting the retailer once their neighbourhood Zellers store is converted to a Target,” says UFCW Canada National President Wayne Hanley. “At the same time, more and more shoppers are learning about Target’s response to Zellers workers and those shoppers are voicing their disappointment with the global retailer, as they should,” adds the leader of Canada’s leading retail workers’ union. UFCW Canada represents Zellers workers at 15 locations in three provinces, British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec.

“The Zellers workers who have stepped forward to lead this campaign are only asking for the things that we all want and deserve. They’re asking for respect and fairness, and Target clearly has the ability to do the right thing here. This is an important opportunity for Target to show Canadian consumers that it walks the talk when it comes to social responsibility,” says Hanley, making reference to Target’s stated “commitment to the community”, as outline on the retailer’s website. The posting of the billboards and bus-stop ads follows a day long leafleting effort by campaign activists at the recent Target Pop-up store in Toronto, where curious shoppers came out in the thousands to catch a glimpse of celebrated fashion designer Jason Wu.

Target is one of the world’s most successful retailers and many Canadians are excited about shopping in new store locations that offer a weekly ad, coupons, regular store hours and the company’s popular redcard.

Target will soon be hiring in Canada and that is a good thing. But Target can be an even stronger force in our community by giving Zellers workers the respect they deserve. With your help, Target can be a leader in creating better, fairer jobs that benefit our communities today and well into the future.

This website is operated and maintained by UFCW Canada. This is not a Zellers or Target website, but features current Zellers workers who have all volunteered to tell their stories and share their opinions. UFCW Canada is a not-for-profit worker organization dedicated to social justice and creating better living standards for its membership and all working families.